by Sonya Clark
He nodded. Dani lifted her knee just enough for him to speak. “Guy down in Belmont,” he wheezed. “Goes by DJ Housecat. Him and the Russians, they can’t stand each other. He might put the girls to work if they’re willing, but he don’t mistreat them.” He coughed and she moved her knee out of his way. “Belmont’s pretty much his.”
“Where in Belmont can I find him?” The Belmont neighborhood sat west of Lincoln Heights.
“Place called Dirty South. And that is all I know, I swear.”
Dani tucked a twenty into the guy’s pocket. “Feel free to tell your buddy that you were such a good boy, I paid you.” She stood and headed out of the alley.
“You’re a real hardass, you know that?”
“No,” she called over her shoulder. “I’m a real badass.”
Cheesy bravado, but still, it made her feel slightly better after a day of failure. Not that she especially minded beating up jerks for information, but she couldn’t help wondering something. Nobody had wanted to talk to Dani – would they talk to the Cabrini Ghost? That question, and all the questions it spawned, needed pondering before she tried anything different. She wasn’t too keen on waltzing into Belmont without knowing anything about this DJ Housecat guy and his operation. Kevin might help her with researching that, but she wasn’t up to facing him again yet.
She found a rooftop to watch the sun sink into the lake. Kevin’s cologne teased from his black jacket that she’d worn again without asking permission. The balaclava was still stuffed in a pocket. At the first sound of a siren after full dark, she took out the phone he’d given her and checked the hashtag. Mostly nothing, until she refreshed and came across tweets timestamped only seconds ago. Several blocks away from the sirens, somebody claimed a group of men were menacing two young girls.
It might be nothing. They might get home safe and sound without any help.
Or they might not.
Energy thrummed through her body. Something pushed at her from the inside, like a gale force wind made of guilt. A young girl’s voice, screaming for help, begging not to be abandoned, echoed in Dani’s head. Would that voice ever stop? Was there anything Dani could do to earn more than just a few hours of peaceful silence? Right now, a few hours of peace sounded like a better deal than none at all.
Dani withdrew the balaclava and pulled it over her head. She didn’t like the idea of being called a ghost, but she’d rather be the one doing the haunting than be the haunted.
***
Someone else tipped off the police about the dead girl’s body. Kevin had to read the story twice before the words made sense. He hadn’t slept all night and his eyes were beyond tired. The cops had no ID on the girl, no clues about who killed her or why. Reading between the lines, they didn’t seem to be on fire to solve the case, either. Just another body dumped in the bad part of town. Dani was out searching for the other girls. He’d given her another phone and some cash to take along with the sketches.
Copies of those sketches stared back at him from where he’d affixed them to an easel in the room that served as his art studio. All were young and pretty with Eastern European features. The best thing to do would be tip the police, with these sketches and one of the man Dani suspected of being a killer, though strangely she hadn’t wanted a sketch of him. Figuring out how to do that and truly stay anonymous was the tricky part. Dani wasn’t interested, though. Whatever it was that drove her to take on over a dozen criminals by herself, to jump from a rooftop to do it, had sent her into the streets to deal with this herself. And by not turning her in, he was helping her. From the moment he’d offered her aid, he’d become an accomplice to any crimes she committed.
He was an accessory to murder.
Kevin ran from the room. He barely made it to the large bathroom in the master bedroom in time. It seemed like every meal he’d ever eaten had come back to haunt him. Head hanging in the toilet bowl, he vomited until he had nothing left. He dragged himself up to the sink and splashed water on his face then brushed his teeth. The whole time, he avoided meeting his own gaze in the mirror.
She was a killer, and unstable.
She’d been brutalized, and still suffered from trauma.
She’d torn through that house full of traffickers like an avenging angel of death. How many more might she kill just to find those other three girls and keep them safe?
How did she jump from the rooftop of one building to the fire escape of another?
She’d saved his life the night he was attacked, and she’d fought those traffickers to give the girls time to escape.
But she’d still killed. What the hell had he been thinking, offering her sanctuary in his own home, help with a new identity? Dani was a killer. The smart thing to do would be to call the cops and have her arrested.
But would that be the right thing? It was true that she showed no remorse over killing some of the traffickers, but she didn’t seem particularly bloodthirsty otherwise. That thought was some kind of pretzel logic or something on his part, as if he was desperately trying to find some reason to not pick up the phone and call the police. He didn’t want to turn her in. Hell, as far as he knew, the cops weren’t even looking for her. The news said it was considered a gangland dispute between rival factions. She could, in theory, leave town with her new identity and no one else would ever know what she’d done.
The biggest moral quandary Kevin had faced up until this point was whether or not to tell Brandon he’d once broken the “hands off the baby sisters of friends” rule, with Brandon’s sister. He’d punked out and failed that test, too, never admitting it. All the drinking and partying and women (who weren’t his best friend’s sister) – that was child’s play compared to this. This wasn’t seeing a friend shoplift and laughing about it, this wasn’t taking his older brother’s car for a joyride when he was fourteen, it wasn’t any of the dumb, petty things he’d seen and done during his entire dumb, petty existence.
This was homicide. Revenge, maybe, indirectly, but not justice. So the question Kevin had to ask himself now was, could he continue to help Dani, or did he need to pick up the phone and make the call that would likely send her to prison?
Kevin had no immediate answer, just a tangle of instinct and emotion. And no time to keep brooding about it. He was due at the shelter soon. He cleaned up and managed to down some coffee and toast before leaving.
Four hours later his chest was sore where his ribs were still healing and his hands were raw from scrubbing pots in hot water. The hours had served as a respite, the physical labor allowing his brain to turn off for a while. He was no closer to any answers. Yellow light from an ancient streetlight greeted him as he stepped into the alley behind the shelter. Thorpe had insisted Kevin park in the alley. His car looked unscathed but the two kids he’d paid to keep an eye on it were gone. He hurried around the front as he unlocked the door with the remote.
Dani sat with her back to the alley wall, legs outstretched toward his car. He came to a halt, hoping that squeaky fear noise he’d heard was only in his head and hadn’t come out of his mouth. She was wearing his jacket again. Her hair was a dark, tangled mass. Her lower lip was puffy and bloody in one spot and a nasty scrape highlighted one cheekbone like Halloween makeup blush.
“What happened to you?” What happened to the people you fought, he thought but didn’t ask.
“Ah.” She waved a hand dismissively. “You know how it is.”
He knelt beside her. Her eyes were clear and she appeared calmer than when she’d left the apartment earlier. “Let’s go for a drive. You can tell me about it.”
By the time they were north of 110th Street, traffic had tapered off considerably. Instead of heading downtown, Kevin took a circuitous route around the western edge of Point Sable, sticking to surface streets and taking his time. He gave her room to breathe and sure enough, she talked when she was ready.
“I didn’t find them.” She stared out the window, her right arm resting on the doorframe, fingers tapping. “W
ent to a bunch of places. Bars. Couple strip clubs. Places where people who have nowhere to go hang out. Nobody would talk to me, even for money.”
“Do you think the Russians have intimidated people into silence?”
“Maybe. I think it’s more likely it was me. All cleaned up like this, I don’t look like I belong. That made people suspicious.”
He glanced at her. It was true, she didn’t look like she belonged on the streets. Even slightly beat up like right now. “Tell me about the fight.”
Dani laughed. “I checked that stupid hashtag. Then I went and got myself into a little tussle.”
“A tussle?” The thought of tussling with her made his stomach flutter, and not in a bad way. Jesus, he needed to make up his mind whether he was scared of her or turned on by her. Or just admit it was both.
“Some big, dumb guys who thought they could take what they wanted from any girl they wanted it from. I just showed them otherwise, that’s all.”
That pleasant flutter turned to worry. “But you’re okay, right? Are they okay?”
“I’m fine. They’re a little banged up but I didn’t break anything.” She snorted. “Well, maybe their egos.”
Kevin worked his way east through the city, heading toward the penthouse. Usually driving relaxed him. Just turn up the stereo and drive aimlessly, not caring where he wound up or how long he was gone. He did it a lot when a sketch or a painting was giving him trouble. It helped clear his head. With Dani in the car, so close he could reach out and touch her, there was too much noise in his head for him to relax.
She didn’t speak again until they were in his private elevator. “Can we go to the roof?”
“Sure.” He pressed the appropriate button.
The city lights blazed in the sky. A patio with a few tables, chairs, and chaise lounges, semi-protected from the elements, was empty thanks to the brisk breeze coming off the lake. Dani dropped into a chaise lounge, feet crossed at the ankles, relaxed.
He looked closer. No, she wasn’t exactly relaxed. Everything about her spoke of a momentarily subdued tension. Jagged slashes of red and orange fighting on top of a deep well of barely visible blue – that’s how he would have captured her on canvas right now. The image in his head made his fingers itch to paint.
“I really screwed up,” she said.
“How’s that?” He pulled a chair next to hers and sat so they were facing each other.
“I know I need to leave. Even if I don’t leave town until I find those Russian girls, I need to leave your place. Put as much distance as possible between the two of us.”
Kevin could hear the offer in her voice. All he had to do was accept, and she’d be gone. He thought about the research he’d spent the day on. Everything he’d learned. Everything he suspected.
The decision wasn’t so hard after all.
Chapter 17
The wind lifted strands of his hair. He stared at the ground, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped. Her stomach clenched in anticipation, Dani waited for him to say it. Yes, you should leave. I made a mistake. You were stupid to think you deserved any kind of sanctuary, any help.
No, Kevin wouldn’t say that. She couldn’t imagine him being so overtly cruel. She could be cruel enough to herself without anyone helping, except for maybe the voice that haunted her nightmares.
He brought his gaze up to meet hers. “I did some research.”
Dani sat up. This wasn’t what she’d expected to hear. “About what?”
“The only business bigger in the world is drugs. Billions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of people, and nowhere near enough arrests. It’s modern day slavery.”
Her blood chilled. She pulled his jacket tighter around her.
“It’s hard to pin down accurate numbers. I looked at several legitimate sources of information but the numbers vary. What it comes down to is, a lot of people. A lot. Some are sold into labor. Sweatshops, agriculture, even restaurants. Most of the victims, though.” He stopped and looked away.
“They’re sex slaves,” she said.
Kevin met her gaze, his blue eyes gone dark. He nodded. “Street corners. Massage parlors. Strip clubs. Brothels. Escort services. The private property of men with no morals.”
The question was written all over his face. She wasn’t sure how to answer without giving too much away. “I guess you could say I was in the labor category. I wasn’t a sex slave.”
He swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing. “But the traffickers who sold you…they, they hurt you?”
Dani didn’t want to answer this one at all. “Yes.” No details. Nobody ever needed details. From the raw, agonized expression on his face, he understood enough without needing a play by play of the things done to her and the girls who became her friends.
He was quiet for a long time. No pity, no sympathetic murmurings. Just silent companionship. Something wove between them during that silence. He’d given her his trust when he brought her into his home. Now, the thing that passed from him to her in the quiet, windy night felt almost like acceptance, or at least what she’d once imagined such a thing to be. Sometimes you didn’t need to talk a thing to death, you just needed to let it recede into the past until it was too far away to keep its grip on you. Therapy had helped Nicole but Dani and Angel, they’d both wanted nothing more than to leave it behind.
“What happened those three days,” Dani began haltingly, not sure how to explain what she felt. “It was a thing that was done to me. It was a nightmare, but the stuff that screws me up are the things I did to myself. Decisions I made that were wrong, and I can’t take them back or fix them. That’s the stuff that.” She stopped.
“The stuff that haunts you,” he finished for her.
“Yeah.” The momentary peace she’d bought by beating the crap out of a bunch of assholes began to dissipate, like air slowly leaking from a balloon. She rose and walked to the parapet that protected the patio from the edge of the roof. A helicopter took off from a nearby skyscraper. She followed its progress until it was nothing but a pinpoint of light in the distance.
Kevin joined her. “I haven’t been able to find much about the sex trafficking business here in Point Sable. Some vague articles about how it exists, and the programs that help people who escape. Apparently the numbers in Point Sable are higher than average. Women are brought here and if they don’t stay, they wind up in smaller cities and towns across half a dozen states.”
“So it’s a hub city for trafficking?”
“That was the impression I got. The lack of detail was frustrating.”
“I’m guessing one of the details missing is who runs it?”
He nodded. “Just some vague mentions of organized crime.”
“No shit.” Just because the Russians were involved didn’t necessarily mean they were in charge. “How powerful are the Russians?”
“I don’t know. I could tell you all about organized crime in this city decades ago, but now?” He shook his head. “I don’t know enough to be sure of anything.”
“Can you find out?”
He was quiet for a moment. “Yeah, I think so. I can tell you one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“The city’s organized crime used to be run primarily by Irish and Italians. That’s changed. All the old guys, they all died off or went to prison or went legit. That side of the city is run by different people now, different families and organizations. But I’d bet a big chunk of my trust fund that one thing hasn’t changed.” He paused for a moment. “The old guys had cops on their payroll. The current ones will too.”
Some part of her had known that, because of her own bad experience with police. Crime at that level couldn’t be run without corruption greasing the wheels. That wasn’t why she hadn’t bothered with tipping off law enforcement about the dead girl’s origin. “Even good cops don’t put much time into investigating crimes against sex workers.”
“And the bad ones, they’d likely tip off the
Russians.”
“I failed today,” she said. “I can’t do what I need to do like this.” She lifted her hand to indicate her face.
Kevin grinned. “I, too, have trouble accomplishing anything because I’m just so damned pretty.”
The joke took her by surprise. Surely there was no place for laughter in a conversation like this. Maybe that’s why it felt so necessary to let it roll out.
“A hoodie’s not so great,” Kevin said. “Somebody might get close enough to pull it down and get a look at your face.” Even in the limited light, it was impossible to miss the twinkle in his eyes.
“Yeah, I had the same thought.” Dani pulled the balaclava from the jacket pocket. “That’s why I grabbed this when I took your jacket.”
He took the ski mask from her and studied it. “If you go after Russian mobsters, you’ll have their enforcers after you. You’ll have bad cops on their payroll after you.” He raised the balaclava. “You’ll have good cops after you for being a vigilante.”
She took it back. “I can take care of myself.”
He tilted his chin up. “Not that you’ll tell me just how you’re able to do such a good job of that.”
Dani leaned against the parapet, facing him. He’d given her sanctuary. He was paying for a new identity for her. Out of his trust fund, sure, but just because he was loaded didn’t lessen the fact of his generosity. He hadn’t turned her in to the police even though he probably should have. He was offering more assistance by way of research. All this because she’d saved his life.
So what did she owe him? By helping her, he was putting himself in danger. He seemed to understand that, and he still wanted to help.
And of all her secrets, it was hardly the worst. Besides, she needed to download that photo she’d taken of the Russian who liked using a stun gun. Better to tell Kevin and have him prepared for that than freak out.
Okay. Okay. Just tell him. What’s the worst that could happen? He could bail on her. Then she’d lose her new ID, and all of his help. Surprisingly, that paled in comparison to losing his…friendship? No, they weren’t friends. They couldn’t be, because she couldn’t stay in Point Sable.
